English rugby union's top clubs have won their conflict with the Rugby Football Union after they agreed to the expansion of Premiership One and Two to 14 teams each and accepted the boycott of European competition next season.
After more than a month of negotiations between panels representing the Union and clubs, the RFU Council confirmed a structure that should last seven years.
The other issues debated were player contracts and divisional rugby. There will be three-way contracts between the player, his club and the RFU, thus denying the Union the wish to have England players exclusively contracted, while divisional rugby is over for the foreseeable future.
There will be play-offs this month between Bristol and London Scottish, and London Irish and Rotherham. There is no relegation from Premiership Two and four clubs from Jewson League One are promoted. However, on the horizon are the ominous threats of Fran Cotton's special general meeting to call a vote of no-confidence in the Council.
The issue of a possible International Board ban on English clubs having any contact with any of the other 80 Unions around the world because the clubs have challenged IB rules in Europe is also unresolved.
Next season it is intended that the bottom club in League One is relegated and the second from last to play-off against the runners-up in League Two, whose champions will automatically be promoted. The RFU failed to force the clubs back into Europe so Bath could defend the Heineken European Cup.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article